Tool Texts
31 records
A Conversation on Electronics and Black TV with Aldo Tambellini Tools
A recorded conversation between artist Aldo Tambellini and engineers Charles Bruner, Ronald Reisdorf, John San Pietro and Kenneth Wise about electronic media and future aesthetics; participants discuss television, videotape recorders and monitors, cathode-ray tube walls, computers, lasers, holograms and three-dimensional immersive spaces. Tambellini proposes an art of Black as a moving, temporary force controlled by the artist's mind; Wise and Bruner describe domestic and architectural applications while Reisdorf and San Pietro emphasize collaboration between artist and engineer and the transmission of electronic image forms. The discussion links electronic light and energy to future social and spatial transformations.
Colorizers Come of Age Tools
Overview of video colorization and synthesizers, describing NTSC color theory and the Y-I-Q system and explaining color subcarrier and chrominance bandwidth (color burst 3.58 MHz). Reviews early analog colorizers and raster/video synthesizers and cites devices and practitioners including the Sandin Image Processor, Paik/Abe Synthesizer, Rutt/Etra, EAB Videolab, Colorado Video Corp. and Computer Image Scanimate; outlines the Video Modular System (VMS) colorizer: A/D (four-bit/16 levels, sampled at 14.3 MHz), D/A, RGB encoder, computer interface (Z-80, TRS-80 and others), and modules (8-input/3-output matrix, pattern generator, multiplexer, RGB decoder, frame buffers 390x600x4-bit); lists applications in labs, medicine, industry, security and video art and notes VMS price starting about $2,000.
Construction of a Raster Manipulation Unit - Revision by Jason Bernagozzi at Signal Culture, 2016 Tools
Construction of a Raster Manipulation Unit — Revision by Jason Bernagozzi (2016) is a revised documentation developed in part from the Experimental Television Center's original 1980 document by Sherry Miller Hocking, Walter Wright, Richard Brewster and Dave Jones; the original aimed to preserve methods of building the tool as conceived by Nam June Paik and Shuya Abe and the concepts behind its operation and functions. Bernagozzi's revision is based on that original and is supplemented by new research by Bernagozzi, Signal Culture and Dave Jones; the new documentation is presented not as a replacement but as a reinvestigation using modern concepts and methods.
Cycles. Description of film by Jordan Belson and Stephen Beck Tools
Cycles. Description of film by Jordan Belson and Stephen Beck. Description of Cycles, a film by Jordan Belson and Stephen Beck. Catalog entry for Pyramid Films, Santa Monica, CA. 1974
Design Device - A Unique Video Synthesizer Tools
Proposal from WMHT TV to the New York State Council on the Arts for the Design Device, a hybrid video synthesizer conceived by Tom DeWitt and Phil Edelstein in 1975 after sketches in Poughkeepsie; DeWitt developed the design drawing on documentation from an NEA Fellowship and with graphic help from Vibeke Sorensen. The instrument was specified to combine vector and intensity approaches, include RAM-based memory oscillators, a RuttEtra display, a camera-controlled matrix switch, a colorizer-sync adder and interfacing to PDP-11/10 computers; WMHT and the Electronic Music Studio at SUNYA supplied facilities and some equipment, the NEA awarded a $10,000 grant in April 1975, and the proposal budget totaled $22,000.26.
Electronic Video Image Processing: Notes Towards a Definition Tools
Situates video art from the late 1960s portable-recording era; over fifteen years artists extended performance, conceptual, narrative, documentary, formalist and experimental practices. Defines electronic image processing as working with video signal parameters (frequency, amplitude, phase) and electronic tools—oscillators, synthesizers, computers, monitors and printers—to manipulate imagery using keying, superimposition, digitization, preprogramming and real-time techniques. Addresses distribution and reception issues, distinguishing video from television and noting alternative technologies (cable, satellite, video disc, VCRs) and interactive systems that give viewer control, and raises questions of reproducibility, editions and the location of the art object.
ETC 1972-73 Tools
While working for the Experimental Television Center the author and David built the first four Jones Frame Buffers; the pictured unit is the author's and may be the only one remaining in the original card rack after David rewired most into newer, larger boxes. The unit adds second-level control and 2v differential video inputs and output with a plexiglass panel; it was initially controlled by a Sinclair ZX81 with programs saved to audio tape and later adapted for control from an Amiga 1000. The buffer includes an internal keyer, four memory boards providing 64 frames and a pseudo-color option; Amiga Basic routines were compiled to C but required unbuilt libraries for blank switching, producing noisy routines.
ETC 1973-74 Tools
This Jones video synthesizer is comprised nearly exclusively of Jones designs. This synth includes a video patch panel made of an inset piece of hardwood with mini-jacks carrying 2vpp differential video (subsequent modules use Plexiglas). The advantages of this standard is that it limits crosstalk a…
Experimental Television Center Studio System Manual - Keying Tools
Two manual sections from the Experimental Television Center Studio Manual: Keying Process by Matthew Schlanger (c. 1984) and Keyers by Sherry Miller Hocking and Richard Brewster with Peer Bode, Hank Rudolph and Matt Schlanger; both appear in the 1980 and 1986 studio manuals. The text defines keying as mixing two video signals under control of a clip reference, explains synchronization of vidicon tubes/CRTs across 525-line frames and 262.5-line fields and notes a horizontal line frequency of 15,750 Hz. It describes three-input luminance keyers with VCA channels A and B, clip-level thresholds, internal versus external keying, and wipes using an externally synced oscillator.
Final Report to the National Endowment of the Arts Tools
Final Project Report to the National Endowment of the Arts concerning control structures for digital computers used in art-making; the report contrasts analog and digital approaches and proposes rich non-linguistic inputs and the simulation of analog systems within digital computing. The project team recorded roughly eight years of preliminary use of slide potentiometers, dials, joysticks and data tablets, diagnosed limited human-computer degrees of freedom, and set goals to create dynamic, flexible, user-programmable multidimensional controls with constructive feedback that are easy to construct, documentable for moderate electronic skills and affordable. The work produced four device categories: pressure-sensitive keyboards, sensing clothing, force-feedback dials and time-based computer variables.
How a Monitor and Camera Work: The Scanning Process Tools
Technical explanation of CRT raster and interlaced scanning using the US 525-line standard; describes how an electron beam draws two fields of 262.5 lines to form a 525-line frame, producing 60 fields or 30 frames per second and a line frequency of 15,750 lines/sec. Details monitor and receiver operation (cathode, control grid, deflection plates, fluorescent screen, brightness and contrast, blanking pulses), camera operation with a vidicon tube and deflection coils converting light to video voltage, and signal types and sync (horizontal and vertical) including generation and recording.
Light and Darkness in the Electronic Landscape: Some Aspects of the Video Image Tools
Barbara Buckner's lecture, presented at the Collective for Living Cinema in February 1978, analyses the video image's technological and aesthetic properties, describing electron-beam scanning (525 horizontal lines, 30 frames/second, two fields per frame, 1/60th second vertical retrace), tape recording, monitors and sync pulses. She contrasts video and film, discusses video image processors and computer-based video synthesizers (citing Donald E. McArthur, Experimental Television Center, June 1977) and considers implications for storage, automated composition and the artist's role in machine-assisted image-making.
Principles of Electronic Image Processing - Image Processing Systems Tools
Technical overview of video synthesizers (image processors) defining them as integrated assemblages of video signal sources, processors, and controllers; examples cited include cameras, decks, character generators, oscillators, keyers, VCAs, mixers, colorizers, sequencers, SEGs and frame buffers. The text classifies three signal types (video, sync, control) and lists system elements (sync, routing, output amplifier, monitoring, control); it explains termination and genlock use, describes monitoring equipment (waveform monitor, vectorscope, color and B/W monitors) and outlines the function of colorizers.
Principles of Electronic Image Processing - Scanning Tools
Overview of CRT scanning for camera and monitor rasters, describing pixels and a 525-line frame assembled from two interlaced fields of 262.5 lines (30 frames/sec, 60 fields/sec, 15,750 Hz line frequency) with approximately 483 active lines and about 460 dots per line. The text explains retrace and timing intervals, active versus timing lines, dot-matrix organization, the Kell Factor and typical vertical resolution (~343 lines), and cites persistence of vision and phosphor retention. It also summarizes standards history: NTSC (FCC 1941; US, Canada, Japan), 625/50 Hz Western Europe, 819/50 Hz France, NTSC color (US early 1950s), PAL (late 1960s), SECAM (France; USSR/Eastern Europe), 1969 EIAJ and consumer formats VHS and Beta.
Principles of Electronic Image Processing - Signals Tools
Technical overview of electronic image processing emphasizing video as a time-dependent medium and defining signal as changes in voltage that encode image information; outlines categories of signals (video, audio, control, synchronizing) and their roles in generation, alteration and control of images. Presents electrical fundamentals including voltage, current, resistance and Ohm's Law, waveform representation and measurement (oscilloscope, waveform monitor), modulation, filtering, analog versus digital structures, and control techniques such as potentiometers and voltage control. Notes Michael Faraday (1822) and Woody Vasulka's vector technique using the Rutt/Etra Scan Processor; cites Johanna Gill, Video: State of the Art 1976.
Principles of Electronic Image Processing - Switch, Mix, Compare Tools
Overview of electronic image processing outlining imaging systems as signal generators, processors and controllers and describing switching, sequencing, mixing and comparing techniques. It defines switcher types (broadcast and distribution), timing and sync issues including internal versus external sync and vertical-interval switching; it explains sequencers, mixers, fades, wipes and keyers with clip thresholds, oscillator control signals and waveform-based patterns, and notes SEG/mixer re-entry. Switchers and mixers are identified as commercially developed prior to and during the 1950s.
Principles of Electronic Image Processing - Sync Tools
Technical overview of synchronization in electronic video, distinguishing picture information and sync information and explaining horizontal and vertical sync, blanking intervals, sync pulses, equalization and serration pulses, and the role of internal and external sync generators. Provides timing specifics: one horizontal line 63.5 microseconds (52.7 µs visible, 10.8 µs blanking with ~1.27 µs front porch and ~4.76 µs horizontal sync/back porch), vertical blanking ≈1330 µs, field = 262.5 lines, line frequency 15,750 Hz and color subcarrier ≈3.58 MHz with burst on the back porch; VIR on line 19 and VIT on lines 17–18 and captions by networks and PBS in 1980 are noted. Cites Les Levine in Gregory Battcock, New Artists Video (1978) and David Antin, Video's Frightful Parent (1975).
SAID (Spatial and Intensity Digitizer) Tools
The Spatial and Intensity Digitizer (SAID) was developed for the Experimental Television Center in Binghamton, New York, arising in 1976 from an effort to create a low-cost, video-speed analog-to-digital converter; the project implemented a 6 bit A/D and a companion 6 bit D/A, supported interactive-compositional and automatic-production modes, and produced posterize and mosaic effects in real time. Donald E. McArthur (b.1938; Ph.D. Theoretical Physics, University of Nebraska, 1967) designed SAID and later co-developed the McArthur/Schier Digital Image Generator with Jeff Schier for the Vasulkas; Walter Wright wrote the first program and Ralph Hocking and Jeff Schier participated in hardware arrangements.
Scan Processors Tools
Scan processors alter CRT deflection rather than the video waveform; transformed displays are recorded by rescanning the CRT. Nam June Paik, with Hideo Uchida and Shuya Abe, developed raster-manipulation techniques in 1962–64 and exhibited at Galerie Parnass (March 1963); the Experimental Television Center documented his unit with National Endowment for the Arts support in 1978. Bill Etra and Steve Rutt, with Sid Washer and Greg Leopold, prototyped the DC-coupled Rutt/Etra at the WNET TV Lab with New York State Council on the Arts support (1972–73); Lee Harrison III's Computer Image Corporation developed Scanimate and Caesar.
Stephen Beck Talks About Video Tools
PDF of Stephen Beck Talks About Video Provides a biography of Beck, the development of the Beck Direct Video Symnthesizer at National Center for Experiments in Television at KQED, and his video work
The Evolution of Thinking Machines Tools
Experimental Television Center - The Evolution of Thinking Machines The image processing system used today in the studio of the Experimental Television Center is a hybrid tool set which encourages interactive relationships among older historically important analog instruments such as colorizers and …
The Macro Proto Proposal Tools
Daniel Sandin's early draft grant proposal advocates developing educational machines and interfaces; he compares public-school capitalization ($10 per participant) with modern communication-company capitalization ($20,000 per worker) and argues for economic efficiency through appropriate technology. He discusses transfer of course content to machines and the loss of incidental learning, the advent and uses of generalized machines including pencils, television and general-purpose digital computers, and the necessity of teaching generalized-machine use. He emphasizes perceptual learning, cites Rudolf Arnheim and the Bauhaus Institute of Design, and stresses man-machine feedback control and perceptually rich input-output interfaces.
The Role of Technology in the Art of Nam June Paik: Paik's Video Sculpture Tools
Nam June Paik advocated humanizing television by treating the set as an artistic and educational medium and by promoting television as a vehicle for aesthetic and philosophical expression; he physically altered television exteriors and inner circuitry to disrupt rasters and broadcast signals and created distorted images, videotape loops (notably a twisted Richard Nixon face, 1967) and television sculptures such as Zen for TV (1963). He exhibited techniques in a 1963 electronic art exhibition and premiered his first videotape in 1965; installations and prepared sets were shown at venues including Galerie Parnass and Wuppertal, where audiences could manipulate microphones and signal generators. Critics and publications cited include John Margolies (Art in America, 1969), Gene Youngblood (Expanded Cinema, 1970) and Radical Software (1970).
The Role of Technology in the Art of Nam June Paik: Paik's Videotapes Tools
Nam June Paik, an early pioneer of video art, experimented with television from 1959 and purchased the first Sony portable video recorder available in the United States in October 1965 with a John D. Rockefeller III grant. Collaborating with Shuya Abe, he built the Paik/Abe video synthesizer at WGBH and the Experimental Television Center to enable real-time color and image manipulation; WGBH broadcast his four-hour Video Commune in 1970, and Paik published technical diagrams and assisted in creating consoles for WNET, the California Institute of the Arts and the Experimental Television Center.
The Video Synthesizer - Review of Existing Synthesizers, excerpted from "Design Device" Tools
Tom Dewitt presents the Design Device, a proposed video synthesizer to be controlled by a mini-computer reading a formatted picture language; the instrument is intended to perform video synthesis and signal processing and to let artists prepare and record programs on paper. He reviews existing vector and intensity-based synthesizers and modular, matrix, and computer-controlled patch systems, citing Rutt/Etra, Stephen Beck, Dan Sandin, EMS Ltd., Computer Image Corp., Vector General, Arp, Woody and Steina Vasulka, Don Buchla and Bell Labs. Planned features include memory oscillators for arbitrary wipes, an outline generator to reduce volumes to lines, rotation via low-frequency sine-cosine control voltages, and colorization approaches using luminance, chrominance and hue.